Vivid History: 'How Money Got Free' Is the Untold Story of Bitcoin

I have long suspected, owing to its sheer brilliance and idiosyncratic beauty, that bitcoin was in fact brought here by aliens from another planet.

Brian Patrick Eha's vivid history of bitcoin, "How Money Got Free: Bitcoin and the Fight for the Future of Finance," which captures in thrilling journalistic fashion what I experienced in my years working on this remarkable technology, only confirms my suspicions.

I regret not recording what I saw and felt while working on bitcoin — the fleeting moments of intense joy and dismay that once seemed too meaningful ever to forget. But at the time, it was all I could do to keep up with the pace, and my life became a blur of 80-hour working weeks devoted to the engineering project of a lifetime.

As the years passed, and the blockchain industry exploded, it seemed that these beautiful moments of intellectual adventure would remain only as fading memories, slowly dimming as I aged.

The idea that an author could capture the essence of that stirring time seemed impossible even in my most optimistic moments. Yet, just as I had initially done with bitcoin, I came to find in reading Eha's book that I had underestimated once again.